Girl child education is still a major challenge in rural India. According to UNESCO’s 2026 Global Education Monitoring (GEM) report, significantly fewer girls than boys complete upper secondary education in rural areas. Here, against every 100 boys, only 59 girls complete their studies up to this level. In contrast, in urban areas, parity is noted between boys and girls in terms of education completion. Data from the report shows that there is a gap between rural and urban areas in terms of educational opportunities and completion status in the country.

The state of education in rural areas is alarming

According to a UNESCO report, the gender parity index in completing higher secondary education in rural India is 0.59. At the same time, it is recorded at 1.00 in urban areas and 0.89 in the country as a whole. This means that girls still lag behind boys in rural areas, while parity has been achieved between the two in cities. This index compares the education completion status of boys and girls. This should not be considered as the dropout rate.

Girls progressing from secondary

According to UDISE+, the national transition rate from secondary to senior secondary level in 2024-25 was 75.1%. The rate was 77.9 percent for girls and 72.4 percent for boys. That means the infection rate of girls in this stage was 5.5 percent higher than that of boys.

There are also differences in the statistics of states. In Karnataka, the infection rate for girls was 70.3 percent and for boys 54.9 percent. In Uttar Pradesh it was 80.2 and 73.5 percent. In Assam the rate for boys was 62 per cent while for girls it was 61 per cent. In Meghalaya, the percentage of girls was 48.3% and that of boys was 47.1%.

The difference is also global

According to the report, 63 percent of girls and 60 percent of boys worldwide will complete upper secondary education in 2024. In Central and South Asia, completion rates were 57 percent for girls and 60 percent for boys.

In Nepal, 89 percent of boys and girls were completing lower secondary education by 2024, but at the upper secondary level, 53 percent of boys completed their studies compared to 44 percent of girls. Cambodia and Costa Rica also show signs of narrowing the gender gap at various levels of education.

Data from the report shows that despite the increase in girls’ participation in post-secondary education, there is still a need to achieve equity in educational attainment in rural areas.